The burdens we bear
by Alias-vendor
Summary: Movieverse. SPOILER ALERT full summary inside : Hawkeye blames himself. No one realised it would hit him that hard. Involves everyone but centres around Barton.
1. Chapter 1

Summary: Hawkeye blames himself for Coulson's death. No one realised it would hit him that hard.

Disclaimer: I've been told by the government to claim I don't own them to avoid raising suspicion…guess I screwed that up, huh?

…

It had started somewhere amongst the chaos of the battle. Someone had made an innocent comment, a reminder of what they were fighting for. Not just for New York, for Earth, but for the memory of Phil Coulson – whose death had been the impetus needed to spur them into action. It had probably been Rogers; dedicated, in his role of leadership, to keeping them motivated even when the odds seemed insurmountable. It hadn't clicked when Stark had told Loki he'd pissed Coulson off – not many could, he was a perpetually calm man, but if someone stood a chance it would have been that lunatic. Hell, that lunatic had a natural talent for pissing people off. He _enjoyed _it. It hadn't clicked when Thor had expressed his sorrow that the 'Son of Coul' could not be present for the battle as he was a mighty fighter and a noble man. But Steve's words he just couldn't misinterpret. He had nearly dropped his bow. It was only years of training that kept his fingers clenched around the grip, immeasurable hours of honing that kept his arrow pointed straight at the target. He didn't falter, not physically.

'What?' His face was blank, his hands steady. He never missed a breath, and he never missed his targets.

'You did not know?' Thor sounded genuinely concerned, his voice crackling through their communication line.

'No.' Clint said shortly. He twisted to shoot something that had the drop on Iron man. He nailed the driver straight in the throat.

'I had that guy,' Stark protested.

Clint didn't bother to respond. He waited for someone, Rogers or Thor or anyone, to pick up the conversation. His eyes were darting around the battlefield, his brain whirring as he calculated distances and angles, as he observed patterns and formulated strategies. He left barely an inch to absorb the new information, he couldn't afford any more.

'Barton…I'm…Loki stabbed him,' Rogers said after dithering over how to put it. 'After he escaped the…cage.' His words were punctuated with the vibrations from his shield. 'Thor was trapped…Agent Coulson was the only one there to stop him…'

'I am sorry.' Thor, a red and silver blur to his left, seemed truly upset. 'It was my fault.'

'No, it wasn't.' Clint brushed his words aside. Phil Coulson. Dead. The words should never have needed to be used in the same sentence.

'I can close it,' Natasha's voice filtered through the communication link. 'I can close the portal.' She was unreadable, as always. He knew though, that she had known. She should have told him. He'd had a right to know.

'Do it!' Rogers yelled.

'No,' Stark countered. 'Guys, I've got a nuke coming in and I know just where to put it.'

They fell silent. Watching. Waiting. He'd run out of arrows. He set his controls to 'grappling hook' and waited until the quiver whirled and changed the head before grabbing his last arrow. He'd only get one shot at this. He dived off the edge of the building, twisted in the air, nocked the arrow, and shot it. He didn't miss. The hook crunched into the concrete and he swung down and smashed through a window several stories down. He landed hard on his back, shattered glass spread out around him. Some of it had lodged in his uniform, some of it in his arms, but for the most part it was only his back he had to worry about. The shock of the collision sent the bow clattering from his grasp, his fingers unclenching instinctively upon impact. The quiver was digging into his back, and fire was racing down his spine. It wasn't the pain that knocked him out. It was more the rather forceful way his head was introduced to the floor.

…

'Agent Barton?'

Something – or someone – was assailing his ears; one of the few body parts that didn't currently hurt like hell. He bit back a groan as he slowly rose into a sitting position, and then regretted his hasty movement. The room wavered as his eyes refocused and he dropped it onto his knees to prevent himself from keeling over. His back was aching but he doubted he'd seriously injured it, he could move all his limbs after all. Shards of glass dotted his arms, most of them miniscule but a few cuts were bleeding steadily.

'Agent Barton?' He recognised Rogers' voice. 'If you can hear me, please respond. Has anyone seen Barton?'

His mouth was dry. His first attempt to produce words yielded nothing even remotely audible.

'Who's worried about Barton?' Stark sounded like hell. 'Now me, I fell out of the sky.'

'Shut up Stark,' Natasha, though fierce, sounded a little less snappy than usual. He'd known she had a soft spot for the genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist. It was there, if you knew where to look. 'Clint?'

'Where's Loki?' He rasped once he'd gathered enough moisture to do so. He could smell the metallic tang of blood, could taste it where he'd bitten his tongue.

'We're going to get him now.' Rogers answered instead. 'What's your position?'

'Same as before,' he reached over to grab his bow and checked it for damage. 'About half-way down.' His quiver was intact though it had taken most of the force of his landing. He thought he probably had an imprint embedded in his back.

'I will retrieve him,' Thor volunteered.

He usually would have protested, but he didn't intend to miss apprehending Loki. He wished he had a least one arrow left, but knew he would never have been given the chance to use it. Thor would never allow him, or anyone, to kill his brother. No matter what he'd done or who he'd killed.

Less than a minute later the glass shards were rattling on the ground as a wind swept through the building. Clint shielded his eyes from the debris until it died down as the demi-God landed, his hammer spinning to a halt.

'Friend Hawk, are you unharmed?'

Clint rose to his feet, ignoring his back's protest, and rolled his shoulders gently.

'More or less,' he watched as the other man's eyebrow rose.

'You are bleeding.' He pointed out, sounding as if he actually believed Clint hadn't noticed.

'Flesh wounds,' Clint held back his annoyance. They were wasting time. 'Let's go.'

'As you wish.' Thor pulled something out of his belt. 'I retrieved this for you.'

'Thanks,' he accepted the arrow and slid it into his quiver. He changed the tip to explosive. Maybe he'd get a chance at Loki after all. Thor grabbed him by the neck of his uniform and began to spin his hammer rapidly. They took off, and Clint slid his fingers a little more securely around his bow. He wasn't sure he wholly approved of this particular method of flying. He preferred to be in control.

'Where is he?' He asked quietly, knowing Thor would hear him through the communication link. From his vantage point the city looked like a Lego play set that someone had smashed through and then set on fire for good measure.

'My brother had an unfortunate encounter with our friend Hulk.' Thor explained, his tone grim.

Though there was nothing even remotely funny about the situation, Clint felt the corners of his mouth twitch. It wasn't a laugh, or a smile, but the beginnings of satisfaction. Loki would get what was coming to him and, as far as he was concerned, the Hulk was an excellent place to start. Frankly he didn't care who had a shot at the guy, as long as he was just conscious enough for him to extract his revenge. Slowly, painfully, vengefully. It would never be sufficient, he wasn't naïve enough to believe that everything would be better, but it would be something.

They landed on Stark tower around the same time as the rest of the Avengers. Stark looked a little worse for wear and there was blood on Natasha's face, but all in all they had come out of it remarkably intact. He turned his gaze to fix on his target. Loki had his back to them, but he no doubt knew they were there. A primal rage was brewing in his chest, something that he had to work hard to control. He had, over the years, learnt to master his emotions. He'd never wanted to succumb to them more than in that moment. It would be so easy. It would take him seconds. The others probably wouldn't have enough time to react. He could have an arrow embedded in Loki's eye before they even realised he'd set his sights on him. Except that Natasha had turned her calculating gaze on him the moment they'd landed. There was knowing in her eyes and she was tense with anticipation. He returned her look with nonchalance, but tightened his grip ever so slightly. She shook her head; _don't_. His finger twitched. He saw her eyes follow the movement, though she did nothing.

'Come,' Thor clapped him on the back with enough force to inflame his injury. He winced but shook him off and strode toward the doors. He didn't realise he'd grabbed the arrow from his quiver and nocked it until he was staring down the shaft, his unwavering gaze fixed on his target.

'Are you going to shoot me, Agent Barton?' Quiet laughter followed the amused question as Loki turned to face him. He was sitting on the ground, bruised and battered but smiling as if he'd somehow engineered the fight so that he would lose. He always seemed to be in control, as if every single thing occurred by his design. Well, Clint wasn't playing his games anymore.

'Well? If you are, perhaps you'd better do it quickly. I can't see my sap of a brother letting you kill me.' His voice was light, conversational. They could have been talking about the weather. 'He's rather sentimental that way, the fool.'

He could hear raised voices behind him, hurried steps.

'Stand down Agent Barton!'

Loki continued to smile as if he already knew the outcome. He obviously didn't think Clint would actually shoot.

He had mere seconds to make the shot. He only needed one.

His fingers twitched.

…

'He disobeyed a direct order,' Nick Fury was, uncommonly, as furious as his name suggested. Not a lot could rattle the director of S.H.I.E.L.D but nothing roused his temper as much as disloyalty and insubordination. At those times he conveniently forgot his own, frequent, deviation from the orders given by his own bosses – most recently his refusal to authorize the firing of a nuclear missile into the Island of Manhattan. In any case, this was different.

'He was compromised,' Natasha countered. She glanced over to where Clint was lying, unconscious, on a pristine white bed. She wasn't sure who had knocked him out. It could have been Rogers, Thor, or, most likely, the Hulk. They'd been too late. He'd already released the arrow by the time someone sent him sailing across the room to slam into the wall. He hadn't missed, but he hadn't killed Loki either. The guy was immune to bullets and, it seemed, arrows as well. He hadn't managed to snatch it out of the air, but the wound had healed almost instantly after Thor had pulled it out. The pained scream though…her lips curled at the memory. It was a pity Clint hadn't been able to hear it.

'Then he should never have been there in the first place. He knows that, you both do.' Fury dropped the volume, resignation colouring his words. He wouldn't punish Barton, not when he would have done exactly the same thing in his place. Still, he had a position to maintain, rules to follow, and at the very least he had to give him verbal hell for it.

'He didn't know…at the time.' She brushed her red hair behind her ears, her fingers dusting over the small cut in her forehead. It had stopped bleeding, but a bruise was forming.

'Didn't know what?' Fury was already moving on to something else, namely the negotiations with Asgard. He knew he'd never get what he wanted –which was Loki surrendered as a war criminal and delivered to S.H.I.E.L.D to be judged for his crimes – and, really, the world was that bit safer if the unhinged demi-God was off the planet anyway. He just didn't want to get off on the wrong foot with the Asgardians thinking they could have anything they wanted.

'Coulson.' She said simply.

A shadow fell over the director's face, his expression tightening. It made sense. He couldn't blame Barton for wanting to avenge Phil, he even approved of it. If there was one thing Fury really wanted to see Loki made accountable for, it was the death of his right-hand man. His one good eye. It was a loss that had shaken each and every one of them, but he could see why it might have affected Barton most of all. Phil had been his mentor, had originally brought him into S.H.I.E.L.D and the two had been close ever since.

'Damn.' He sighed and waved his hand. 'Alright, Romanov. He'll be suspended from active duty until we can assess his mental state, but there will be no disciplinary action. In the meantime, Stark has offered his mansion as a temporary living space for the team until we get this whole mess with Loki sorted out.'

She nodded as he turned and walked away, his trench coat wafting around his shins. It was something Clint had never failed to point out and mock until finally all he had to do was raise an eyebrow and she would be unable to stop the slight twitch in her lips. A faint sound caught her attention and she turned to see Clint beginning to stir. She couldn't see it now, but his entire right side was pretty much one giant bruise. It was a fairly impressive one, too, and she could tell it would be around for weeks. She walked through the glass sliding door and up to the corner of his bed. His eyes were closed, but the slight wrinkle in his brow suggested he was very much awake and very much in pain. The air was stale and sterilized, it smelt like a hospital. She despised hospitals.

'Clint?' She shifted her weight slightly, her arms straight against her sides. Situations like the present one often made her uncomfortable, even though she knew Clint better, sometimes, than she knew herself. He didn't answer, didn't open his eyes, but his breathing changed almost as if he were trying to convince her that he was still asleep. Where before it had been just that little bit laboured, now it was deep and steady. She wondered how much effort he had had to put into his little façade.

'I know you're awake.' She made no attempt to mask her annoyance. He was being childish, and she didn't take well to being ignored.

There was still no response. He continued breathing steadily and didn't as much as twitch. She brushed aside the hurt she felt at being shut out by her closest, and only, friend.

'Fine.' She turned on her heel and left.

His breathing stuttered, almost inaudibly.

…

'So,' Tony looked between the silent archer, and the agent who'd dropped him off. The agent shot him a sympathetic look before jumping into the driver's seat of the black BMW and hurrying away. Tony was left standing awkwardly in front of his mansion, facing a man he didn't know particularly well and who didn't seem inclined to say anything at all. Barton was wearing causal clothes with dark sunglasses, and had a simple knapsack slung over his shoulder. There was no sign of his bow or any other kind of weaponry, a fact that Tony was just a little grateful for. The man was, after all, suspended from active duty because S.H.I.E.L.D was afraid he may have lost his coconuts. Either that or Loki had stolen them, either way the result was the same. Possibly crazy and weapons weren't an equation he was particularly fond of.

'Welcome to my place.' He waved half-heartedly at the mansion behind him. He couldn't tell if Barton was looking at him, at the house, or just standing there with his eyes closed. The thought irritated him. 'Shall we?' The sarcasm slipped out. Oh well, he'd tried.

He turned and walked towards the door, fairly confident the other would follow him. If he didn't, well Tony didn't actually care. He could stand outside for the entire month if he wanted. He couldn't hear any footsteps behind him, though that probably didn't mean anything considering the other man's profession. He walked on. He went through the door and briefly contemplated letting it slam in the archer's face before deciding it probably wasn't the best idea. He held it open, and the man walked through without acknowledgement. He let the door go and headed upstairs. Best to just show the guy to his room and then let him stew in it.

…

Steve heard the distinct crunch of gravel as the car cruised out of the driveway and glanced out the window of his room to investigate. It looked like Agent Barton had arrived. He watched as Tony – _Stark_, his mind emphasised – walked out to greet both him, and the agent accompanying him. The agent reached out and shook Tony's hand, they seemed to exchange words, and then the agent got back into the vehicle and drove away. Barton, however, did nothing. Steve frowned slightly. He wasn't sure what was going on with the archer, and S.H.I.E.L.D hadn't told him much other than that the death of Phil Coulson had hit him hard. This seemed different, though, than simple grieving. He would know – he was grieving for everyone he had ever known. Something else was bothering him; he just wasn't sure what it was. He wanted to find out, though. He wanted to help if he could. He knew that he, himself, would have been in a considerably different place if S.H.I.E.L.D hadn't helped him come to terms with everything that had changed during his '70 year nap' as Tony - _Stark_ -referred to it. He had heard that Barton wasn't talking to anyone – not even Natasha. They'd sat him down in front of numerous psychologists and he hadn't so much as sneezed in their presence. It was, frankly, concerning. He had locked himself away inside his head and refused to let anyone in.

Steve watched as Tony led Barton inside and wondered if he should go down and say hello. It was almost certain that Barton wouldn't respond, but maybe it was worth a try? He walked out of his room and saw Tony standing in front of the door of one of the other rooms.

'Where's Agent Barton?' His pulse raced, as it always did, as Tony turned to face him and suddenly it was as if Howard was there. In those brief moments he felt like none of it had happened. As if he had never crashed that plane, never ended up frozen in ice only to be defrosted and brought back to life nearly 70 years later. He had, very carefully, never mentioned this resemblance to Tony. He'd picked up on the fact that their relationship wasn't exactly stellar.

'In there.' Tony seemed thoughtful. It was the expression Howard had used to get when he was thinking of a new invention, or solving a complex problem…he had to stop doing that. He knew Tony wouldn't appreciate it.

'Already?' Steve frowned, how on earth were they going to help him?

'Yup.' Tony started walking away, that same distant expression on his face.

Steve walked up to the door and rapped on it gently.

'Agent Barton?' He waited awhile before he realised that he wasn't going to get an answer. 'Agent Barton? Can I come in?' He tried to turn the handle, but it was either locked or something was blocking it from the other side. He sighed, well he wasn't going to break down the door, and left the agent to his own devices. Hopefully Thor, Bruce, or Natasha would arrive soon. He was starting to get bored watching the television and listening to the kinds of songs Tony thought he _should_ like. He didn't really like _any _of them, and Tony point blank refused to let any of the songs Steve actually wanted to listen to in the house because his father had also liked them. He really wanted to know what had happened between them to make Tony hate Howard so much. He'd been a good guy – a lot like Tony actually. Maybe that was why they hadn't gotten along.

…

It was the middle of the night when Bruce Banner arrived at the mansion. He'd just finished the last bits of his work with S.H.I.E.L.D – mainly studying the Tessaract because they had it in their possession for a few weeks before they had to return it, with Loki, to Asgard – and had been shipped off immediately due to some 're-furbishing' that had to take place. He wasn't complaining. He actually liked Tony, for whatever unfathomable reason, and was eager to see his lab and some of the projects he was working on. The agent escorting him stopped the car outside the mansion – which Bruce did _not_ gawp at – and politely reminded him not to forget his bags. He thanked the man absent-mindedly, grabbed his bags, and slid out of the car. Everyone was probably asleep but Tony had told Jarvis to let him in – or at least, that's what Fury had told _him_. He walked up to the door and pondered how to proceed. Did he just…knock? Or talk to it?

'Hello?' He wondered out loud, reaching forward and knocking lightly on the door. Nothing happened. He sighed. Fantastic, he was spending the night outside. He had just resigned himself to his fate when the door swung open, seemingly of its own accord. He looked around, and then shrugged. Stranger things had happened.

'Hello?' He said again as he walked through the door, thinking maybe Tony was up after all. Out of the corner of his eye he caught a fleeting glimpse of some kind of shadow, or black fabric, disappearing up the stairs. Weird. He followed it and ended up standing at the foot of a corridor with doors on either side. One of them had a piece of white paper stuck on it. As he got closer he could see it read 'Bruce & Hulk' in Tony's distinctive scrawl and had a green smiley face next to it. He pushed his glasses back up his nose, his mouth twitching in a smile.

…

'So, I'm wondering how you got in last night?' Tony asked casually at breakfast, waving his spoon in the air as he did so. It finally came to rest pointing at Bruce as he glanced quizzically at him. 'I mean, there were no holes in the walls and the roof was intact…'

'Didn't you tell Jarvis to let me in?' Bruce asked, confused, as he buttered his toast. He wasn't much of a breakfast person, but he did enjoy hot toast. And coffee.

'Yes, well, about that…' Tony crunched on a mouthful of his cereal. 'I may have shut him down, um accidentally, for a brief period of like twelve hours to implement some new programming…so…'

'Well someone let me in,' Bruce sipped his coffee. He peered at Tony over his glasses, his eyebrow raised.

'STEVE?' Tony yelled suddenly.

'YES TONY?' Steve's voice floated down from the above floor. He sounded resigned, like he was used to Tony shouting at him from anywhere in the house.

'DID YOU LET BANNER IN LAST NIGHT?' Tony drenched his cereal in milk, leaning back with a sigh of satisfaction.

'NO. IS BRUCE HERE?'

'NO. I WAS JUST WONDERING…YOU KNOW, FOR KICKS.'

'OH.' There was a pause in which Steve most likely assessed the probability of sarcasm, then 'HI BRUCE.'

'H-you know what, I'm not doing this.' Bruce shook his head and took another bite of his toast. He should have known any place occupied by Tony Stark would literally _drip_ with crazy.

'BANNER SAYS HI_.' _ Tony, finished with the spoon, lifted the bowl to his mouth and drank the leftover milk.

'Why doesn't he just come down?' Bruce ate his last piece of toast and sighed with regret. Maybe he should've made it last a little longer.

'I think he likes yelling,' Tony, having noticed, pushed another piece towards him.

'I think _you_ like yelling,' Bruce corrected, eyeing the proferred toast. 'Steve obliges you.'

'Call it what you will,' Tony said airily. 'Me? I call it love…'

'Try insanity,' Bruce suggested, accepting the toast. 'I thought Barton was here as well?'

'He is.' Tony frowned. 'It's like the Phantom of the Opera around here.'

'What?' Bruce coughed; a piece of toast went down the wrong pipe. Whatever he had expected to hear, that definitely hadn't been it.

'Guy doesn't come out at all during the day, but I swear he's creeping around at night. I've tried to catch him in the act but…' he shrugged, 'Phantom of the Opera. Only without the singing…and the creepy white mask.'

'I know that movie,' Steve announced as he came down the stairs. 'I do. I saw it.' He was dressed in a simple t-shirt – which strangely looked out of place on him – and a pair of jeans.

'Congratulations,' Tony drawled. 'You're a real boy.'

'That…I don't get.' Steve sat down to Tony's left and helped himself to a few pieces of tost and a hefty bowl of cereal.

'Really?' Tony raised an eyebrow, 'because that _was _out in your time.'

Steve shrugged and dug into his meal. Moments later his blue eyes lit up as something occurred to him.

'Maybe Agent Barton let you in, Bruce?' He seemed somewhat excited by the prospect.

'Were you listening in on our conversation?' Tony affected mock disgust. 'And to think I let you in to my _home._'

'Probably,' Bruce agreed, completely ignoring the melodramatics occurring across from him. 'Process of elimination would tend to agree. Unless there are any other guests I should know about?'

Steve shook his head. 'No, just us and Agent Barton. Thor's coming soon, and Natasha's away on some top-secret S.H.I.E.L.D mission. Are there any more knives, Tony?'

'In the draw. No, the other one. Left. Getting warmer…warmer…hot.'

'Where? I can't see any…' Steve rummaged around in the aforementioned draw but, short of a few forks and some little spoons, there were no knives.

'Oh for-' Tony got up and joined him at the draw. 'Huh…I could have sworn I had more.'

'Here, you can use mine.' Bruce offered his knife up.

'Thanks,' Steve sat back down and used the knife to bury his toast in butter.

'You could have just dumped the whole tub on it,' Tony pointed out. 'The result would have been the same.'

Bruce picked up a newspaper lying at the end of the table and stuck his nose in it, hefting it up so it blocked the other two out of his vision. He needed a bit of normalcy in his routine, otherwise he'd probably go _stark_ raving mad. He had a private chuckle at his joke and refused to answer when the other two questioned him on it.

…

'Sir?'

'Yes, Jarvis?' Tony continued to sketch a new design on a piece of paper.

'You asked me to let you know when Agent Barton was in the shower. Agent Barton is currently in the shower.'

'Excellent.' He dropped his tools and hurried out of his workshop. He didn't know how long he'd have to snoop around, but he intended to make the best of it.

'Jarvis, initiate override on Agent Barton's door lock.'

'As you wish, sir.' Jarvis replied dutifully, but Tony could have sworn he heard apprehension in his tone.

When he reached the room the agent had been assigned he opened it cautiously, making as little noise as he possibly could. He tip-toed into the room and surveyed it. It looked…normal. So he could safely tell Fury that Barton wasn't holding cultish rituals in his room. Granted, that theory had been a little farfetched, but he prided himself on being extremely thorough – in _all_ aspects of his life. In fact, very little in the room had changed since the guy had moved in – almost nothing, actually. One thing that had changed caught his eye. There was a piece of paper tacked to the wall with a face he couldn't quite distinguish drawn crudely upon it. What made it harder were the various holes clustered around the centre, where the figure's face would be. The glint of silver on the chest of drawers clued him in to what had happened - Barton had obviously been hurling filched butter knives at it. _When_ he'd lifted them from the kitchen, Tony had no idea, but he was somewhat of a ninja so it didn't exactly surprise him. He'd have Jarvis pull up the security footage later; see if maybe he could intercept him next time. The guy was clearly stewing over something, and he was pretty sure he knew what. He decided to confiscate the knives to create the need for what was probably a midnight sneak around the house and, after brief contemplation, gathered up the few forks as well. He had a sneaking suspicion…he peeled the paper off of the wall and looked underneath it. Yep. He made a mental note to get some kind of short term archery range set up so the guy wouldn't keep putting holes in his walls. With _butter_ knives. Thank God he hadn't found the steak ones. Did he even have steak knives?

'Jarvis?'

'Yes, sir?'

'Have someone collect all the steak knives and hide them somewhere far, far, away.'

'Of course, sir. Shall I do that now, sir? Agent Barton is looking particularly murderous this morning.'

Tony turned slowly around.

'Oh, hey man. Rough night?'

Despite his tone, it was actually a genuine question. The archer didn't look as if he'd slept – or eaten, for that matter - at all...the whole week. He had dark shadows under his eyes; he was paler than usual, and looked about ready to collapse. It was the first time Tony had seen him since he'd moved into the house, aside from the very brief glimpse he'd gotten one morning when he'd uncharacteristically got up at three A.M with what he had genuinely believed was the solution to time travel. Turned out it was just a wildly fantastic dream and had absolutely no basis in scientific fact. In his defence, he may have been marginally drunk at the time. Or, you know, hammered.

Barton, who'd just walked out of the ensuite, said nothing. He simply leant against the wall and folded his arms as if preparing to wait the other man out. His expression wasn't murderous – he'd have to knock 'loose interpretation of facial expressions for own personal enjoyment' out of Jarvis's programming – so much as…vacant. The other man – aptly nicknamed 'the Hawk' or 'Hawkeye' would usually have stared Tony down rather than avert his eyes as he was currently doing. There was literally no expression on his face. He looked like a ghost.

'Okay, well, bye.' Tony took one last glance at him, and then left. He didn't really know the other man well enough to assume any kind of familiarity. Besides, he was out of his depth in any situation that involved feelings or psychological well-being. In short; he was an insensitive ass who would probably make whatever was wrong, worse. Someone needed to talk to the guy, but it sure as hell wasn't _him_.

…

A/N: This was supposed to be a one-shot but it's getting crazy long so I'm splitting it into however many chapters it turns out to need (hopefully not too many). Please let me know if the characters seem OOC as the only thing I have to go on is the movie and I've only seen it twice…


	2. Chapter 2

Since Tony was accustomed to thunder storms heralding the arrival of their friendly neighbourhood demi-God, he was vaguely amused by the irony when Thor arrived on a perfectly sunny day. Seriously, there wasn't a single cloud in the sky. Granted, he wasn't beaming – or whatever it was that he did – down from Asgard, instead simply travelling from the S.H.I.E.L.D headquarters as he'd insisted upon being present for any interrogation of his brother. He was probably afraid they would _accidentally_ maim the guy or something. It was a valid concern. Tony was watching from the top floor window as the speck flying towards them grew bigger and bigger. He had been contemplating where to set up the temporary archery range and, having done so, how to get Barton to use it instead of throwing butter knives at his wall. He had then realised that it would require him giving the agent a weapon (namely his bow) with which to shoot. He wasn't overly fond of that idea. Also, S.H.I.E.L.D had prohibited it. Not that that would usually stop him, but in this case it seemed a reasonable request. Don't let the potentially disturbed agent near any weaponry, _particularly_ a bow. He could see the logic. He remembered all too well the absolute chaos the archer had caused when under Loki's enthrallment. People just shouldn't be _able_ to do those things with such a simple and archaic weapon. Not that anyone, Nick Fury included, actually believed that Barton would attempt to harm anybody. It was just a precaution. Company policy. Maybe he'd let him keep the butter knives (Barton had found their hiding place and stolen them back) if he promised not to throw them at the walls. Although, extracting a verbal promise might prove a difficult task. Perhaps he'd get him to write it down.

'Greetings, Tony Stark!' Thor landed on the balcony, sending wind billowing into the glass doors.

Tony waved at him from inside and then opened the door so he could come in.

'No bags?' He raised an eyebrow.

'I possess not these 'bags' you speak of,' Thor looked somewhat ridiculous standing in Tony's very modern mansion dressed like he was at a renaissance fair.

'But you _do_ own other clothes?' Tony appraised him somewhat mockingly. 'Maybe this, in another colour?'

'You disapprove of my garb?' Thor looked confused. He shifted his shoulders, chainmail rattling as he did so.

'Oh perish the thought,' Tony swept the back of his hand across his forehead. 'I just want to know if you wear it all the time.' He raised an eyebrow.

'Verily, it is so.' Thor confirmed.

'Okay,' Tony stroked his chin, ignoring the language choice – for now, though in the future he planned to corrupt the demi-God's vocabulary. 'Let me ask you this: when you go to bed, do you wear that?'

'I do not.' Thor snorted as if the notion was ridiculous.

'I knew it.' He threw his hands in the air. 'What do you wear? Fluffy pajamas with little hammers? A toga?'

'I know not of this 'toga' you speak of.' Thor looked at him strangely, and then added 'Pray tell me the meaning of 'pajamas'.'

'They're like a…thing we lesser mortals wear to bed,' Tony said eloquently. 'They can be…fun, quirky.'

'I fear I misunderstand,' Thor shook his head. He looked perplexed. 'It is Earth culture to cover oneself upon retiring to ones chambers?'

'You guys don't do that?'

Thor shook his head.

'Uh huh…well, you can keep your sheets. Call it a gift.'

'Many thanks, my friend.' Thor looked, frankly, chuffed. It was as if he'd given the guy some kind of precious object. 'I shall endeavour to repay you.'

'No need,' Tony waved him off. 'I'm just that awesome.'

…

He never missed.

5 knives. 1 target.

4 knives. 1 target.

3 knives. 1 target.

2 knives. 1 target.

1 knife. 1 target.

He never missed.

If only he had.

…

Bruce was relaxing with a book in Tony's remarkably extensive library – _library, _he was in heaven – when he heard it. THUMP. It reverberated around the mansion, appearing to have originated from somewhere above him. He raised an eyebrow, but continued reading. No doubt it was Tony working on some crazy experiment - although, Tony's lab was downstairs... He shrugged. The book was interesting. The mansion was filled with superheros. If it was a problem, someone else would sort it out. KA-_THUMP_. This time was louder than the last, and accompanied by a softer _slam_. Bruce pursed his lips, and read on. When the next KA-_THUMP_ was accompanied by an equally loud SMASHand what he guessed was a quiet _shatter_, he supposed he'd better investigate into why someone was very obviously trying to tear the place apart. Sometimes it baffled him that he was around people capable of doing that with their bare hands. It didn't matter that he could, as well, it was still just plain surreal. He closed the book and set it aside. Damn, his armchair was just so comfortable. He really didn't want to investigate.

'STEVE?' Tony's voice floated up from his workshop.

Bruce sighed.

'YES, TONY?' Steve, for whatever unfathomable reason, never failed to indulge Tony's little bouts of yelling. Bruce had decided that Tony was right, Steve_ did_ like yelling. In fact, Steve _loved _yelling. What was even stranger was just how _well_ the two were getting on now that there was no need for their ego's to clash over who was in charge. It would have been okay if Steve's considerably more responsible nature had served as a good influence on Tony. That would have been great, actually. Of course what _had_ happened was that Tony was steadily corrupting the somewhat naive man.

'IS THAT YOU?'

'NO. I THINK IT'S AGENT BARTON.'

'WHAT'S HE DOING?'

'I DON'T KNOW – THE DOOR'S LOCKED.'

Bruce took a deep breath and sighed once again. He swung his legs off of the chair and stood up. He supposed he would have to investigate, since all Tony and Steve seemed inclined to do was yell about it. As for Thor, he had no idea where the demi-God even was. He'd seen him a grand total of once that day, just after he'd arrived and was proclaiming to all that would listen that the 'Great Tony Stark' had gifted him some bed sheets. Tony had _basked_ in the praise before leaning in to whisper – after he'd noticed Bruce raising his eyebrow - that the demi-God slept 'as nature intended'.

'TELL JARVIS TO OPEN IT.'

'OKAY,' there was blessed silence for a few seconds, and then '…IT DIDN'T WORK.'

'WHY NOT?'

'HOW SHOULD I KNOW? IT'S _YOUR_ DOOR.'

'Fair point,' Tony conceded quietly, raising an eyebrow at Bruce as they met up on the stairs. 'Hey Banner, you hear that commotion?'

'You mean there's someone on the planet who didn't?' Bruce asked drily.

They climbed the stairs to the second floor, Bruce lagging slightly behind Tony who'd elected to jog. Steve was standing awkwardly by the door, a perplexed expression on his face. Inside the room, it was silent…until KER-_SMASH_.

'What in that name of all that is holy, is that man doing to my house?' Tony knocked loudly on the door, his expression one of curiosity rather than anger. 'Barton? What the hell are you up to in there?'

There was, predictably, no response. There were also no smashing, banging, or crashing noises for which Tony was grateful.

'Agent Barton?' Steve tried. 'We're just a little worried, can you tell us what's going on?'

There was still no response. In the absolute silence Bruce couldn't even make out sounds that would suggest the man was even in the room.

'Maybe he isn't there,' Steve concluded.

'Or maybe he's ignoring us,' Tony countered. 'Jarvis, manual override on Barton's lock please.'

'Sir, it seems that Agent Barton has barricaded the door.'

'Of course he has,' Tony muttered. He snapped his fingers. 'Jarvis, check the video footage. What's he up to?'

'Agent Barton disabled the cameras the first night he was here, sir.' Jarvis responded apologetically.

'And to think I refrained from looking at the footage to respect his privacy,' Tony shook his head, his expression wounded. 'Okay Steve, time to kick the door down.'

'Are you sure?' Steve asked hesitantly.

'Barton?' Tony banged once on the door. 'If you don't answer in the next, oh, 3.5 seconds Steve is going to kick your – well, actually, my - door down. Better stand back, Banner.'

Bruce moved away, wisely deciding that, for once, Tony was right. Tony counted the seconds in an exaggerated fashion and then shrugged when no response was forthcoming.

'Do it.' He pointed to Steve, then to the door.

'…if you're sure.' Steve said uncertainly. He waved at Tony to get back and then positioned himself to kick it down. There was a slight scratching sound.

'Wait!' Bruce saw the tiny slip of white that emerged from underneath the door. He snatched it from the ground and opened it. Four words were printed in neat script exactly in the centre.

_I'm fine._

_Go away._

Tony read it over his shoulder and scowled.

'Sure, _you_ might be fine. But tell me, are my walls fine? Are they, Barton?'

…

He wished they would just leave.

He wished he hadn't smashed the window.

Or the mirror.

Or knocked the chest of draws over and stabbed it until his fingers were raw with blisters and dotted with splinters.

He wished he had missed.

All those years training to be the best marksman in the world.

All those years, spending hours upon hours on the range. Shooting until his fingers were bloody, until he could barely unclench his hands they'd been hanging on for so long.

All those years perfecting his aim.

He had never thought his skills would be turned against him.

Never dreamt that he would one day regret he'd ever touched the bow.

He never missed.

Even now.

…

It was 12 A.M and Tony Stark was wide awake. He wasn't drinking, he wasn't working. He was on a stakeout. He was hiding in the kitchen, watching and waiting. He _knew_ Barton was wandering around at night, and he wanted to know why. So, naturally, he had recruited Steve and Thor to help him. He'd attempted to recruit Banner, but the scientist had point blank refused to help him 'childishly' stalk the agent despite his protests that here was nothing remotely childish about stalking. It was serious business. So while Tony was in the kitchen, Steve was hidden in the hallway and Thor was outside on the roof. Just in case Barton was leaving the mansion.

'Tony Stark?' Thor whispered into the communication link.

'It's just Tony, and what?' Tony whispered back.

'The Hawk hast propelled himself from thy window.' Thor said, using the codename Tony had assigned their target. So it was obvious, sue him.

'Those windows don't open,' Tony frowned. 'He is just _determined_ to destroy my house, isn't he?'

'That explains the smashing,' Steve agreed. 'Are we going to follow him?'

'You bet,' Tony confirmed.

…

He was going to go stir crazy if he had to spend one more second in that room. He felt like the walls were closing in on him. The drawn face tacked to his wall, though mutilated beyond recognition, seemed to be smiling manically. It was laughing at him. Mocking him. He whirled, the knife flowing from his hand in one fluid motion. It lodged in the wall, exactly where he knew the figure's left eye socket had used to be. He hadn't even really looked that time. His hands were shaking. Lack of sleep. Lack of food. A nervous breakdown, maybe. He knew the textbook symptoms, and how to recognise them in another agent. It wasn't so hard to apply it to himself. He had been eating, though. A little – enough to stay alive. Sleep, however, eluded him. He knew you could only last about three days without sleep. After that the hallucinations started as the brain shut down. In severe cases, people died. He'd been going about a week, and the only sleep he'd gotten involved knocking himself out with filched sleep medication. Stark's kitchen was surprisingly easy to navigate. He regretted tearing the room apart, if only because it was a poor way to repay the man's hospitality. It hadn't helped, either. Nothing did. A steady breeze was blowing in through the shattered window, sending the fragments of glass shuffling across the floor. Some of it was piling around his bare feet. He didn't bother to try to avoid it when he started walking. The pain helped. It was something else to focus on. Something that didn't tear him apart from the inside. He pulled the knife he'd embedded in the wall and tucked it into his belt – he didn't like being weapon-less, even if his hand-to-hand was more than sufficient to protect himself. Moving to stand by the window he closed his eyes, feeling the wind against his face. He could smell the brine in the air, the salty tang a pleasant assault on his senses. He inched forward until his toes curled over the edge. The jagged remnants of the glass were sharp, but he ignored them. He crouched down and vaulted lightly over the edge, swinging down to touch his feet against the wall. He kept a hold of the window, careful to keep his fingers clear of the broken glass. He wouldn't be making the climb back up if his hands were cut to shreds. His shoulders shook, his muscles protesting – a reminder that if he wanted to maintain peak physical fitness, he couldn't afford to continue neglecting his body. It was time he found some other form of atonement.

It was a fairly long drop to the ground so he pressed close to the wall and searched for a foothold with his toes.

…

'Guy's a god damn monkey.' Tony breathed.

Slightly to his right, and also flat on his stomach hiding under a bush, Steve tended to agree. The two had sprinted _stealthily_ from the house and had arrived just in time to see the agent flip off of the wall and tuck into a roll that ended up with him rising gracefully to his feet and looking as if he hadn't just defied gravity in some small way. Steve's leg was itchy but he refrained from scratching it, knowing that the movement would alert Barton to their presence. He had dirt and earth pressing into his shirt and pants, some kind of rock under his hip, and he was fairly certain _something_ was creeping along his back.

'Tony?' He whispered, trying to make the sound as small as possible.

Tony turned to look at him, but didn't respond verbally. Instead he pointed at Barton, held a finger to his lips, and then raised an eyebrow.

'Is there a spider on my back?' Steve mouthed.

He saw Tony's eye flicker behind him and back, releasing a sigh of relief when the other man shook his head slowly. He didn't like spiders. He wouldn't say he was _scared_, just that he had a healthy respect for them. Also, they gave him the heebie jeebies. The crawling sensation intensified and he jerked his leg on impulse. The bushes rustled. He gulped. Tony glared. Barton looked straight at them or, rather, through them. His eyes raked over the bushes, but he didn't seem to see them doing their best to look like nothing more than a not at _all_ suspicious bush. After a few seconds he turned around and jogged off at a fairly fast pace. Steve moved to get up but Tony pushed him down and shook his head. He left his hand there until they couldn't see the agent, and then removed it as he crawled out from under the bush. Steve followed suit and then thoroughly checked his back for creepy crawlies. It wasn't an easy task, but thankfully he found none.

'If you're looking for the alien mind control chip – I'm pretty sure they put those in the back of the neck.' Tony suggested helpfully.

'What?' Steve blinked, pausing in his search. Sometimes – scratch that, _most_ of the time – he just didn't understand the things the other man said. Usually because he was either making some apparently hilarious, obscure, reference to something Steve had been frozen for, or speaking words that Steve didn't even know how to pronounce let alone spell. He'd caught up pretty fast with the new slang and he thought he had a decent grasp of the words most people used, but Tony would continually stump him with things like _quark_ and _carbontetrafluoride_ – which Bruce had explained to him was some kind of 'free radical' or something. He thought it sounded far too awkward to use in the everyday sentence. _Hey, did you see that carbontetrafluoride? He blew up that building, man, it sure was swell!_ Then again, maybe he'd misunderstood. It wouldn't be the first time.

'Never mind,' Tony pulled something out of his pocket and fiddled with it.

'What's that?' It looked like a screen with a blinking light on it.

'Tracker,' Tony grinned like the Cheshire Cat. 'I stuck a few on Barton's knives – figured he'd carry them around with him.'

Steve frowned.

'So we_ didn't_ need to hide under that bush. We actually could have waited until he was out of sight and then followed that thing.'

'Probably,' Tony agreed and then clapped him on the shoulder. 'But wasn't this so much more fun. Thor? Time to come down, buddy.'

'Do you not want me to scout from the air?'

'Nu-uh, Barton'll see you a mile away. This mission's incognito. Alright, let's assume codenames from now on. I'll be Captain Awesome, you,' he pointed at Steve. 'Can be Old-timer, and…' he clicked his fingers. 'I got it – Thor, you're Hammerhead.'

…

They were following him. He knew because he had heard them in the bushes. Had seen them – they were almost impossible to miss. As for Thor; he stuck out like a sore thumb almost anywhere, but particularly when he was standing supposedly surreptitiously on an otherwise abandoned roof. Their stealth skills were shocking. Non-existent was the better word – it wasn't exactly a surprising revelation. He had to ditch them. He didn't think it would prove problematic. When, half an hour later, he still hadn't managed to shake them he figured something was afoot. He suspected the knife.

…

'Captain Awesome, this is Hammerhead. I report no visual on the target, over.' Thor said dutifully, parroting the words Tony had drilled into his head earlier. The whole sentence – for that matter, the whole exercise – struck him as unusual and strange, but he was happy to be involved in what Tony had assured him was not only a 'team-building' exercise but also a time-honoured Earth tradition. Who was he to judge what was considered normal on another planet? He supposed it was not unlike the games he had used to play as a child back in Asgard. Usually, though, those games had involved hunting actual targets that they would then proceed to kill. And then roast and eat while they drank themselves under the table. He was a little disappointed that there wouldn't be a 'kill' at the end of their hunt, but Tony had assured him that drinking was most certainly not off the table. Whatever that meant.

The tracker had lead them to the place where their quarry was supposedly holed up. The problem was; he didn't seem to be there. Thor had flown up into one of the trees (at Tony's insistence, since Barton would certainly see him if he just hovered in the air) to try and see if he could 'get a visual' on the man. He couldn't. He was either in hiding, or simply not there. Thor feared the latter, though Tony insisted his tracker was infallible.

'Copy that Hammerhead,' Tony responded. 'Drop down to ground level and proceed to rendezvous point, over.' A series of colourful words followed his statement.

Thor dropped to the ground, landing next to Steve.

'He cannot have disabled my tracker,' Tony scowled at his device. 'I refuse to believe it.'

'Uh Tony,' Steve disappeared into the bushes and then re-emerged with something silver gleaming from between his fingers. 'I don't think he _disabled_ it exactly.'

…

It was 4 A.M and someone was crashing around in the kitchen. The first time Bruce had heard the distant clattering, having been rudely woken from a fairly deep REM sleep, he had simply rolled over and shoved his pillow over his head. Clenching his eyes shut and clamping his hands over his ears, he could almost pretend it wasn't actually happening. After five minutes, it was getting a little harder to ignore. Possibly because it seemed to be getting louder by the minute. He was going to _maim_ whoever it was. Slowly and painfully, which wasn't the Hulk's usual M.O – at least the slowly part, painfully was pretty much a given – but would garner him a greater deal of satisfaction then simply slamming his fist into their head. Not that that wasn't, in itself, deeply satisfying.

He was pretty sure he was in hell. Or damn near close to it, and if he had to get up and sort out whatever mess was currently being formed, then someone was going to _die_. He wasn't picky, but he preferred it to be whoever was currently ranking number 1 on his list of dead men walking. The noise continued. _CLASH_, _clatter, _BANG_. _He wrenched the pillow off of his head and hurled it across the room. Fumbling out of the covers, he slid off of the bed and stomped over to the door, yanking it open with nearly enough force to dislodge it, and then slammed it for good measure. Steve poked his head out of the room nearest to him, his expression befuddled.

'Wha's going on?' He yawned midway through his sentence.

Bruce didn't answer. He wasn't sure he was capable of opening his mouth and not yelling at the top of his lungs. Poor Steve didn't deserve that. Instead he stormed past the baffled man and proceeded to treat each and every step on the staircase as if it had personally offended him. Only one of them dared to creak in protest. He reached the kitchen, and paused briefly to take it in. It was a total mess.

There was shattered glass on the floor. A few cups were rolling around, and what looked suspiciously like a frying pan was dangling precariously from the fan. Thor looked to have passed out on top of the dining table, or had potentially slipped on the large puddle of what looked like beer and smashed into it. He could make out a dent that confirmed that theory. The demi-God was snoring uproariously and muttering words Bruce didn't care to make out. Tony was slouched against the cupboard, very obviously drunk, and staring intently at his hands as if they held the secrets of the universe. Bruce wasn't sure if he was angry anymore or just plain disturbed. A movement to his left caught his eye and he looked up to catch Barton in the process of leaping off from where he had been perched on the door, obviously watching the early morning events unfold. The agent froze in the act, one foot hanging down and the other folded under him, with his arms bracing himself against the wall. Bruce stared at him. It was _way_ too early for that crap. Barton stared back, his expression unreadable yet there was something vaguely vulnerable in his gaze. Bruce sighed, dropped his head, and massaged his temples. When he looked up, the other man was gone. Thor was still dead to the world. Tony was having what appeared to be a rather intense argument with a spoon over something distantly related to quantum mechanics , and Steve had appeared at the bottom of the stairs and was looking, wide-eyed, from Tony to Thor as if trying to comprehend it through his sleep-muddled brain.

'This is _not_ my problem,' Bruce muttered. He turned around and headed back up the stairs, brushing past Steve as he did so. He would maim someone at a more reasonable hour. That someone, he decided, would be Tony Stark. He was, after all, the source of the insanity.

…

Natasha Romanoff arrived later that day. Her reaction to the state of the kitchen and, to a lesser extent, the entire lower floor of the mansion was priceless. Granted, Tony recognised that one needed a microscope or even a telescope to actually _see_ the minute expression that flickered across her face, but he had a _very_ vivid imagination. Not to mention a _very_ intense hangover. So it was, theoretically, possible that he had made it up. He was still going to tell everyone that the world's greatest poker face had shown actual emotion. Even if said emotion was mostly _distaste _and _disgust_ and a lot more words starting with _dis_ and ending with something that implied negativity. Which, come to think of it, was her entire emotional range in a very neat little nutshell. Was she saying something? His neck ached. There was an apple in his hands…why was there…? Thinking _hurt_. Maybe he'd just go back to sleep and…

…

She'd expected to find chaos, sure. It was practically a given when Tony Stark was within ten miles of _anyone_ who would indulge his crazy. Or any_thing_, for that matter. What she had hoped, rather foolishly it seemed, was that Banner would somehow have been able to temper the insanity. She couldn't have been more wrong. His presence seemed to have had absolutely no effect. Stark was passed out against the fridge and she briefly considered smashing some pots and pans together but instead selected an apple from the remarkably untouched fruit basket and pegged it at him. It thumped him on the forehead and then rolled into his lap. He seemed to stir briefly, muttering something she couldn't make out, and then lapsing back into unconsciousness. She hoped he enjoyed it, because when he woke up she was going to make his life hell.

'You don't want to know,' a voice said from behind her. Banner. She tensed just that little bit.

'I really don't,' she agreed. She turned to face him and winced inwardly. 'Long night?'

Bruce gave her a wry smile and stuck his hand in his pocket to search for his glasses.

'Let's just say we're lucky the other guy was feeling remarkably tired last night.'

'And now?' She raised an eyebrow at the wicked smirk that slid onto his face.

'Early morning stress relief,' he chuckled. 'You'll probably hear about it later.'

She noticed he was keeping his distance.

'Is there somewhere we can talk?' She eyed Thor, snoring on the dining table. 'Somewhere quiet?'

…

Bruce took her to the library. It was his own personal sanctuary in what was turning out to be, by far, the craziest living situation he'd ever been involved in. He'd actually been surprised when he'd discovered it; he hadn't exactly pegged Tony for the type. When he'd asked, the genius had shrugged and said he 'liked the look of them'. It was an incredibly blasé attitude to what had turned out to be a fairly extensive and well-stocked collection. Bruce figured it was a cover-up. Tony probably liked books – maybe even read them – but thought it would ruin his carefully constructed image. As if he wasn't capable of doing that in a thousand other ways. Still, he wasn't complaining. He took a seat in his favourite armchair, settling in with a sigh of satisfaction, and just about closed his eyes before he realised that Agent Romanoff was with him. He watched her as she seemed to consider where, and if, she wanted to sit down. She was always unnerved in his presence. Always just that little bit uncomfortable, more on guard with him that with any one of the others. He supposed he deserved it – having nearly killed her and all. She sat down on the nearby couch and, to her credit, didn't sit as far away as she possibly could.

'How are things with Barton?' She got straight to the point.

'Practically non-existent,' he watched for her reaction. He didn't really get one. 'He never leaves the room during the day, sometimes during the night but we rarely see him.' He didn't mention his brief encounter with the man early that morning; something told him Barton wouldn't appreciate it. It was the first time – that he knew of – that the agent had actively sought them out - even if he hadn't exactly made his presence known. It was maybe a little step in the right direction.

She sighed and dropped her gaze. They were both silent for a while.

'Coulson was his mentor,' she said quietly. 'Clint had no-one when he came to S.H.I.E.L.D. Even I don't know how close they really were.'

'You feel that way about Barton,' Bruce remarked astutely.

She looked visibly startled, which was rare for her. He couldn't help the smug sense of satisfaction. She didn't respond, but her silence was telling in itself. Finally she nodded ever so slightly.

'We're not supposed to form attachments in S.H.I.E.L.D.' She looked away, her eyes glazed with nostalgia. 'People die all the time but, it's impossible. I trust him completely with my life – I had to. Trust,' she looked him dead in the eyes. 'Trust can't exist between strangers.'

'People will always affect our lives.' Bruce admitted, 'no matter how hard we try to push them away. I should know.' He had spent years distancing himself because around him, people got hurt. It had proven to be impossible. Here he was, again, with a bunch of people he was – god damn it – beginning to care about. It figured that that even the top-secret spy types would be unable to resist the human connection.

'I'm concerned.' She smoothly moved the conversation back to Barton, 'because I've never seen him like this. His usual method of coping is to hit the archery range until he literally passes out with the bow in his hands. He's never blocked me out like this.' An expression too rapid for him to identify flickered across her face.

'You think that something else is causing it,' Bruce guessed.

She nodded. 'I just wish I knew what.'

…

He was making things worse. He hadn't meant to. He just hadn't been able to face them. Not after what he had done. It was his fault. Coulson, and countless others, were dead because of him. There was nothing he could do to make it better. No form of atonement that could wipe away his guilt. He couldn't face them and he certainly couldn't face Natasha. He knew he was hurting her, though she wouldn't admit it. He couldn't face any of them, but he would have to. To see the blame in their eyes, to know they knew he was at fault. He deserved that, and more.

…

A/N: Thanks for the fantastic reviews guys! You're far too nice to me I'm glad to hear I got them in character though. Thor is a difficult bugger to write! At this point I don't know if there will be Natasha/Clint. I'm just going to see where the story goes, but if there is it will most likely not be explicit at all. Probably more like read between the lines type stuff. Please let me know if I'm going overboard on the angst, too. I sometimes do that.


	3. Chapter 3

_Everything was going perfectly. His plan was good, the execution flawless. S.H.I.E.L.D hadn't known what had hit them when he'd detonated the explosive. He'd watched them scramble around like disorientated termites, struggling to comprehend what was happening – not knowing who was responsible. He had revelled in it. The chaos had thrilled him to the core. He had disabled the computers – there was nothing they could do to stop him now. It was time for the last part of the plan. He backed away from the window overlooking the bridge and turned to head towards the detention block. It wasn't far. Half-way there, he sensed he had a silent shadow. He spun, nocking an arrow and releasing it as his shadow knocked the bow aside. Natasha. He recognised her; he had made a plan for this occurrence. They fought. She was a tough opponent, and one that he had sparred with on many occasions. He knew the way she moved, knew the methods she favoured. But she knew him, too. _

_His head smashed against the railing, his thoughts turning fuzzy. He groaned, attempting to rise but ultimately failing. He slipped to the ground. He managed to force himself to his knees, to look her in the eyes._

_ 'Tasha..?' He saw the expression on her face, though it was so fleeting it could have been imagined. He could manipulate her, use her feelings…her leg whipped out and her foot connected solidly with his face. Everything went black and then…suddenly he was on his knees again. He was looking at her, she was visibly distressed. That wasn't like her…she was lowering her guard, kneeling down, leaning forward. Her hand stretched towards him. _

_ 'Clint?' _

_The knife he had dropped earlier slid smoothly into his palm. The cold smile of a predator twitched at his lips. He had her._

He woke with that smile dying on his lips. He was sweating, the sheets tangled around his legs. He sat up, running a hand across his forehead, and surveyed his palms. There had been so much _blood_. It had been everywhere. On his hands, his shirt, pooling on the ground, splashed against the railings…he could still see the flash of the knife, the horror in her eyes. He could still _feel_ the urge, could taste the scent of blood in the air.

It hadn't happened. Natasha had knocked him out. It hadn't happened. He buried his face in his hands. It _could_ have. He could have killed her. He had _wanted_ to. Just like he had planned the deaths of those agents he had planned hers, too. He couldn't take it anymore. Every time he fell asleep he was back there, trapped in his own body. Trapped in his mind, or some strange parody of it. It had still been him. He had still been in control; it wasn't like someone else was commanding his body. He had planned, he had killed. It was all him. He pushed the tangled sheets down and slid off of the bed. A glance at the clock told him it was only 2 A.M. The butter knives were on the bedside table. He'd need a new target, though. He grabbed a sheet of paper from the drawer, and the pencil and set to work. He pinned it in place and grabbed the previous one, crunching it up and tossing it into the bin. He stepped back, as far as he could go and held the knife in his hand. He felt the weight, curled his fingers.

A crude representation of his face stared back at him.

He threw the knife.

…

Tony Stark had had a rough night. Granted, not as rough as the night that had preceded it, but rough enough that he was actively cursing the day he'd agreed to a drinking contest with the Norse God of Thunder. Not his best move, he would admit. Not exactly his worst, either, but it was somewhere around the middle of that particularly lengthy list. He had, potentially, the worst hangover he had ever experienced – and that was saying something. It was so severe his patented 'Tony Stark's hangover cure' had completely failed to even minutely ease the agony. It was as if an entire choir of bongo drums were banging around inside his head at a party hosted by a particularly rowdy horde of symbols. Not a fun place to be. To make things worse; someone was clattering around in the kitchen with absolutely _no_ regard for the fact that there was at least one hung-over superhero in residence. Possibly two, but he wasn't sure. Thor had looked miraculously unaffected after he'd hoisted himself out of the remnants of the dining table. Then again, his eyesight had been a tad fuzzy so…

There was that infernal clattering again. It was ringing in his ears and adding to the internal cacophony that was his current, miserable, existence. He was never drinking with Thor again. He rolled out of bed and landed, with a thud and a groan, heavily on the floor. He briefly contemplated remaining there. Except that…now something was clinking _and_ clattering. He struggled to his feet, ignoring the increased pressure behind his eyes, and staggered to the door. He was going to invent a particularly painful method of punishment for whoever it was that was so cheerfully banging around. It was probably Steve. He had a god-awful habit of getting up in the wee hours of the morning when normal people were sleeping…or had just staggered into bed after a highly satisfying night of _fun_ – a concept he was steadily introducing the other man to. It was proving a challenging exercise, but let it never be said that Tony Stark was not up to a challenge. Oh God, there were stairs. He stared them down, but they didn't so much as tremble under his slightly unfocused gaze. There was nothing else for it; he would have to go down them. They hadn't won, though. He would have them removed when he got the dining table fixed. Or replaced, it was probably beyond saving.

The chinking and the clattering were still echoing down the hallway. His head was throbbing. He was personifying stairs. The clatterer, whoever they were –_Steve – _was going to get a healthy dose of mechanical cockroaches in their bed. Or maybe real ones, they tended to be a lot creepier. Though he'd have to obtain real cockroaches, and he already had mechanical ones…

He was procrastinating. Slowly, he grabbed the rail and descended the stairs. Every step sent a jolt of pain lancing through his head. He was starting to think that maybe Thor also deserved some mechanical cockroaches in his bed. In his bed in which he slept nude, Tony's brain happily supplied. God, that was _not_ a mental image he wanted anywhere near the forefront of his mind. Or in it at all. He reached the bottom and breathed a sigh of relief. _Scccccccccraaaaaaaaape._

Okay, that was it – Steve was getting _spiders_ in his bed. Real, live, spiders and preferably of the biting, and only mildly poisonous, kind. A good six dozen would do it.

'Steve?' He couldn't even yell at him, it hurt too much. The man didn't respond. He shuffled the last few steps towards the kitchen and then stuck his head around the door to try again. 'Stev-' He blinked.

'Not Steve.' Barton looked up from where he was nosily crunching on some cereal, and said the first words Tony had heard him say since he'd arrived at the mansion. He was seated at the dining table, seemingly uncaring that there was a huge dent in the middle. He looked…different. His face was a little gaunt, and definitely paler than Tony remembered, but he looked marginally better than when Tony had snooped around his room. His eyes though, they were still dull. He hadn't even really made eye contact, his gaze had just skittered from Tony's face to settle somewhere above his left shoulder.

'Um, no you are not.' Tony said slowly. His usually scathing wit was a little hung-over so it was the best he could come up with on short notice. 'Why are you…since when do you…and in the kitchen?'

For all that the sentence was hopelessly fragmented, Barton seemed to understand it.

'Am I not supposed to eat in the kitchen?' He drawled, scraping his spoon along the bottom of the bowl.

'You don't get to do that,' Tony, suddenly angry, forced the words between gritted teeth. 'You don't get to pretend like you haven't just locked us all out for the past week.'

'I know.' Barton met his gaze briefly but Tony could read nothing in his expression.

'Good.' Tony sighed and rubbed his temples, 'because I am _far_ too hung-over for that conversation.'

Barton barked out a laugh, but it sounded wrong. Forced. His spoon clattered into the empty bowl. His chair slid across the wooden floor. Tony couldn't hear him as he walked to the sink, but his eyes followed the movement. He watched the other man's back as he scrubbed the bowl and then set it aside; cataloguing, comparing. He didn't know him well enough to be able to decide if he was acting normally but he seemed more or less fine. Barton finished with his dishes and turned around, raising an eyebrow at the scrutiny, before brushing past Tony on his way out. Tony frowned, and then shrugged it off. He wanted painkillers.

…

Steve had been up at the crack of dawn, as usual. It was a habit so ingrained in him; he doubted he could sleep past 5 A.M if he tried. He didn't mind, though. It was somewhat nice to be up earlier than everyone else, to have the space to himself. He had been lifting weights for about an hour. He wasn't even tired. To be honest, he didn't actually have to lift anything in order to keep his condition but it was relaxing. He'd had a routine going for the past week; get up at 5, lift weights until 6, go for a run until 7, have a shower, have breakfast with whoever was awake (usually Bruce, sometimes Tony) and then engage in whatever ridiculous activity Tony had conducted for the day. It kept him sane, grounded, following a routine. It made him feel as if nothing had changed, even though there was very little that hadn't. It was a pretty impressive gym, despite the fact that, Steve suspected, Tony had never shown any interest in using it. There was a treadmill in one corner, various muscle building apparatus in another (at least that's what he had been told they were for), a boxing ring in the centre, and what looked like a foam mat spread along the entirety of one side. He'd yet to see anyone, other than himself, use the room and he wondered why on earth Tony even had it.

He glanced up as something clinked softly to his right and startled, nearly dropping the weight on his toes. Agent Barton was quietly – _very, very, _quietly – working on one of the muscle building machines and he hadn't seen _or_ heard him come in. He blinked, but the man was still there when he opened his eyes again. It was downright creepy. He wondered if he should say something. He hadn't really said more than a few sentences to the man since they'd first met and they'd pretty much consisted of 'do you have a uniform. Good, suit up. I want you on this building.' That had been it. He hadn't had one, single, even remotely personal, conversation with him unless you counted the very one-sided chat that had basically sparked the other man's somewhat secretive breakdown. So the situation was a tad awkward, to say the least. He realised he was staring, and quickly turned his gaze away. At least Agent Barton didn't seem inclined to chat. He set the weights down and stood, twisting to release the tension in his back. It was time for his run anyway. He was almost out the door when something, he had no idea what, compelled him to open his mouth and speak though he'd had absolutely no intention to do so.

'Would you like to come for a run?' Curse his big mouth and unconscious desire to include everyone in everything. It was silent for a while and he thought that maybe the agent hadn't heard him, or simply wasn't going to respond. All he could hear was the slight clink of the weights on the machine as they moved up and down. His fingers, curled around the door frame, were starting to tap with nervous anticipation. He was just about to give up and leave when the other man finally spoke.

'…yeah.'

Steve blinked.

'Well…great.' He dithered at the door as the agent lowered the weights and stepped off of the machine. He wiped his hands on his dark pants as he approached. He seemed…smaller than Steve remembered. Almost shorter, as if his presence had diminished. He put the thought aside for further contemplation.

'Let's go.'

…

'It's like watching a zoo animal, isn't it?' Bruce heard Tony remark from beside him.

'What?' He turned his gaze to look incredulously at the other man.

'He's like one of those lions pacing around in a cage, when they should be off running around the plains of, you know, Africa.' He made some grand, elaborate, gesture to illustrate his point. It was somewhat wrecked by the sandwich he was simultaneously stuffing into his mouth.

'You think Barton belongs in the Serengeti?' Bruce couldn't help the smile or the snort.

'Hmm, maybe not the Serengeti, per se.' Tony amended. 'He does seem more the Amazonian Jungle type – plenty of trees for him to play Tarzan.'

Bruce turned back to look out the window thoughtfully, his mind sifting through the conversation he'd had with Natasha the other day. It seemed slightly suspicious that, all of a sudden, Barton had started 'acting normally' again. He suspected the man may have been eavesdropping. He wasn't sure if that was problematic. It meant, on one hand, that he had realised what he was doing affected everyone else. On the other hand, it meant that maybe that was the only reason he'd stopped.

…

He was avoiding her. Most people might have been fooled, but she wasn't. How did she know? Why she was actively seeking him out, had been for the past hour, and had yet to find him. Stark's mansion, while massively excessive, just wasn't big enough that it could take an entire hour to search the place. Therefore, he was avoiding her. It was pissing her off. When she did eventually find him – and she _would_, he couldn't hide forever – she was going to break one of his fingers. Maybe two. Then, when she was done, she would demand answers.

…

He didn't want to face her. All he could see was the knife, the blood, her broken body…just lying there... lifeless. Every time his mind turned to her he could remember what he'd thought and felt in that moment. He could feel the thirst for blood – _her_ blood – and the twitch of that smile curving his lips. It made him sick. He had never been one for torture, preferring quick, clean, kills. Loki had warped his mind beyond reparation. He would never be able to erase those images. He would never be able to forget that look in her eyes, the _fear_. That part might have been a dream, something his mind had conjured up to torture him with, but it was as real, as vivid, as a memory.

He knew she was looking for him. So that meant he couldn't be found. He'd almost run into her coming back from jogging with the Captain – thankfully the man hadn't been too eager to chat, having simply made a few short-lived attempts and then focused on running – but had just _known_ right before they'd rounded the corner. He'd fled, with no explanation given to the dumbfounded man he left in his wake, and feeling absolutely repulsed by doing so. He had never run from anything in his life, but this was something he couldn't bring himself to face. Now he was _hiding_ like a frightened child whose mother was stalking around with a wooden spoon. He had fallen so far already, how much further could there possibly be until he hit the bottom? At least she wouldn't find him.

…

A/N: Thanks to StarArrow who pointed out the embarrassing fact that I misspelt the title. Of all the spelling errors to make…

I know this is short but I'm stumbling around with pretty intense writer's block at the moment so I thought I'd post something now, or you mightn't get anything for ages.

Again, thanks for the reviews! You guys are far too nice to me and the only reason I don't reply is because I honestly don't know what to say.


	4. Chapter 4

If someone had asked Tony, twenty minutes ago, who the scariest occupant of his mansion was, he would have said Banner's alternate personality – hands down. Few things could hold a candle to Hulk when it came to the intimidation factor. He was a big, green, mean, killing machine – which part of that _wasn't_ scary as all hell? Now? Now he was of a very different opinion. Banner (read: HULK) was scary – terrifying, even – but there was something unnerving about the mansion's resident Widow. Hulk was all smash, bang, hit the wall so hard you don't even remember how you got there (if you wake up at all, that is). Black Widow? She was more the torture you 'till you break and then smilingly slit your throat type. He was man enough to admit it was kind of intimidating…and, additionally, it kind of turned him on. He liked a woman in power. Especially when…but he was digressing.

'Where is he?'

'Who?' Tony asked innocently. He lent his elbows on the kitchen counter, the perfect picture of innocent nonchalance. Looking at him, in his opinion, you wouldn't know the aforementioned agent was actually crouched behind the counter, gripping Tony's leg like one might the neck of a poisonous snake – tightly. He could actually feel it losing circulation.

'Barton.' Natasha looked like she didn't buy his act for one second. He wondered if she suspected the agent was actually in the room, or simply knew that Tony was aware of his whereabouts. He had a strong feeling it was the former.

'Barton is currently,' Tony began, completely ready to give his location up – if only so that his leg could start breathing again - and then stopped short as he felt the sharp tip of _something_ dig uncomfortably into his shin. '…hiding from you,' He reconsidered and resolved to kick the man somewhere _soft _the moment his interrogator looked away.

'You don't say.' Said interrogator mustered a truly admirable amount of sarcasm into the three syllables. She had one hand on her hip, the other hanging by her side.

'Figured I'd give you the heads up,' he shrugged.

Natasha's eyes narrowed, her lips pursing into a thin line. He watched as she pulled out a shiny, familiar, object.

'I will disembowel you with this pen,' she caressed it with her fingers. 'It will be slow, it will be painful. It will _look_ like an accident.' She flicked it into the air and caught it expertly, never once taking her eyes off of his. 'Of course, _we'll_ know better.'

Tony considered his options. He had Barton, crouched behind the counter and digging something into his leg, which he was also suffocating, and he had Natasha with a pen and the beginnings of a truly creepy smirk forming on her otherwise blank face.

It was a no-brainer.

'You're on your own,' he declared loudly. He looked down to see Barton favour him with a truly dirty look though he didn't stand up, and he didn't release Tony's leg. Tony looked helplessly at Natasha and spread his arms out as if to say 'what can you do?' He felt Barton tug harshly at his pants and looked down.

'Tell her to go away,' the agent mouthed.

'I have a better idea,' Tony told him. 'You tell her, and you face the creepy pen of disembowelment.'

'Please.'

There was something in his eyes that struck Tony. Some vulnerability that suggested there was more going on than he had previously thought. It bore further investigation - which was probably only a possibility if he had the agent's cooperation…and giving him over to the 'enemy' wouldn't exactly inspire said cooperation.

'Actually you just missed him,' he told Natasha apologetically. 'Headed right out that door literally two minutes ago. If you run now you might catch him…'

She didn't look impressed. In fact, if pressed to identify the expression flickering across her face, he might have guessed at _hurt_. Of course it was gone as quickly as it came and Tony was left wondering, once again, if he had simply imagined it because he got so _bored_ seeing the same expression on her face every second of every day. The only thing she ever did was move her eyebrows sometimes when she talked. Apparently it was a Russian thing – the eyebrows, anyway.

'Well if you see him again,' she said slowly, eyes boring into the table as if she was looking through it. 'Tell him to grow up and stop behaving like a pathetic _child_.' Her voice had risen by the end and she said a few more words in heavily accented Russian, which he had absolutely no insight into, before turning and stalking out of the room like a pissed-off lioness. Every step measured, every movement calculated; he could almost imagine the tail flicking behind her. He stopped when he realised he was staring at her ass. Not something he wanted to be caught doing considering the punishment was likely death. Or disembowelment, which eventually led to death. After she had left, Barton released his leg and stood. He tucked a steak knife – the sharp object that had been poking into his leg, undoubtedly – into his belt.

'Thanks,' he muttered. His voice was gruff, the words directed at the floor. He looked distinctly uncomfortable, though it didn't show in his expression. It was more the way he wouldn't meet Tony's eyes – not that that was uncommon for the archer these days – and the way his gaze continually flickered from the floor to the exit, and back. He was likely ten seconds from beating a hasty retreat and had probably only stayed to make sure Natasha wasn't lying in wait for him beyond the door frame.

'I'm just curious,' Tony plucked an apple from the fruit basket (he'd had it delivered when the new table and kitchen bench had been installed) 'Why exactly are you avoiding her?' He waited for Barton to respond, promptly realised no such thing was going to happen, and continued. 'I mean, I get that she's frightening and all – even to trained S.H.I.E.L.D agents and small birds alike, – but aren't you two supposed to be partners, or whatever it is that you cold-hearted assassin types are to one another?' He paused again, though it was purely perfunctory. It was pretty clear this was a one-sided conversation. 'Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but don't partners typically talk to one another? Or, you know, communicate in some kind of special sign language or…'

'Don't,' Barton actually turned and met his gaze. His eyes were steely and resolute, his mouth set. 'Just drop it.' Whether knowingly or not – Tony couldn't be sure – the agent had shifted into an aggressive stance, his weight balanced evenly and his right hand ghosting over the handle of the knife tucked into his belt. It would probably take mere seconds for him to liberate the knife and rehouse it in Tony's chest. The archer could pin a butterfly's wing at a hundred metres…so Tony's manly chest at less than two metres? Not much of a problem.

'Okay, fine,' he took another bite of the apple. 'At least tell me what she said to you.'

'Why?' Barton bit out, clearly frustrated.

'Chalk it up to my pathological need to know everything,' Tony surveyed the apple core, and then tossed it into the trash can. A skilful shot, if he did say so himself.

'She said she was done,' Barton seemed to deflate. He crossed his arms, the gesture seeming somewhat defensive, as he looked away once again.

'That all?' Tony attempted to make light of the situation. It was his go-to play when emotion was involved. 'Sounded like more than that…'

'She was…expressive.' If it was possible, Barton's frown seemed to deepen.

'Ah,' Tony said sagely. 'Russian expletives – it's a good language for them. Not as good as Chinese though,' he pointed out. 'Trust me, you haven't been sworn at until you've been sworn at in Chinese.'

Barton sent a withering glare in his direction and turned to leave, having obviously decided that the coast was clear.

Tony shouted a few expletives after him, in Chinese of course, and then returned to surveying the fruit basket. He wasn't usually a fan of fruit, but it _was_ sitting right there and, honestly, he was too lazy to root around in the fridge for something else.

…

Bruce was having a hard time finding some personal space. It seemed that everywhere he went _someone_ had some kind of problem they absolutely couldn't solve without him. He was, he had come to realise, the designated psychologist in residence. It kind of sucked. He had enough problems of his own without dealing with everyone _else's_.

Thor had been bringing every _single_ language/cultural problem he encountered to him, continually hunting him down to ask what this or that was or repeating some completely ridiculous statement – courtesy of Tony Stark – that made absolutely no sense. Just that morning he'd caught the demi-God attempting to toast a _fork_ because Tony had told him that humans 'typically warmed their implements up before eating with them'.

Steve consistently sat him down for _hours_ to talk to him about how different things were and how much he missed the past, and to complain about how crude and vulgar Tony was. Honestly, he spent most of their 'sessions' on the latter and very little on the former.

Natasha had taken to randomly seizing him and dragging him into cupboards (apparently she'd gotten over her fear of the other guy, or somehow reasoned that cupboards gave her the better advantage in case of an incident) to demand forcefully, angrily, and quite often in Russian, why Barton was acting as he was. Their encounters usually followed the same pattern. She would appear out of nowhere, grab his shirt, drag him into the nearest small, private, space, yell at him for approximately 5 minutes in whichever language she felt like and then storm off without even waiting for an answer. Not that he had one. It seemed Barton was the only person who _hadn't_ utilised his somewhat reluctant services and he was, arguably, the one most in need of them.

He looked up from the book he'd been attempting to read as movement registered on the fringes of his peripherals. Speak of the devil.

'I hope you're not here for therapy,' Bruce said bluntly, only partially joking. 'We close at twelve on Sundays.'

'Nah,' Barton offered a hesitant grin in response. 'Your receptionist set me up with a time later in the week.'

'What would I do without her?' He slid his finger onto the page and closed the book casually around it. 'So you don't want me to ask you how you feel?'

'Actually I want to ask the questions,' Barton shifted from the doorway. 'What's going on with you and Nat?'

Bruce blinked. That question had come completely out of the left-field.

'I'm sorr-what?' He spluttered, pushing his glasses back up his nose.

'You. Nat. Secret meetings in various cupboards.' Barton elaborated, his gaze hooded. 'Are you seeing each other?'

'Of course not!' Bruce surveyed the other man carefully, still disbelieving.

'So much for option A,' Barton muttered. He actually looked…disappointed?

'What's option B?' Bruce asked curiously.

'That it has something to do with me,' Barton looked up from the floor.

'You thought us having a secret tryst was the more likely scenario?' Bruce asked incredulously.

'Wishful thinking.' The agent dropped down onto the couch, his elbows resting on his knees.

'Why?' He was starting to consider the possibility that the other man actually had lost his marbles.

'I don't want her worrying about me.'

'Well she does, we all do.' He resisted the urge to add that if the archer really didn't want Natasha to worry about him, perhaps he ought to try actually speaking to her.

'Don't.' There was more emotion in that one word than Bruce had heard in all of his sentences combined. It wasn't even much. Just a slight break in tone that suggested he was struggling to maintain his carefully crafted façade.

'Why not?' Bruce challenged. It seemed he was conducting a therapy session after all.

'Because I'm not worth it.' Barton yelled, storming from the couch it one swift motion. He stalked to the other side of the room, his fists clenched and a wild look in his eyes.

Bruce watched him with narrowed eyes, his mind putting together all the pieces of the puzzle as they presented themselves. Obviously there were some self-worth issues at work here, but stemming from what? Inadequacy? Guilt? He was denied further opportunity to analyse it by the sudden appearance of one Tony Stark.

'Banner, Fury just called, Loki's es-' Tony, looking dishevelled, stopped abruptly as he recognised Bruce's guest. '…timated to have drawn in about a hundred million in action figure sales. Can you believe it?' He scratched his head, pretending to be shocked.

'He escaped.' Barton said flatly. His mask was back in place, his expression vacant, but his eyes were simmering.

'You know, _escaped_ is a strong word.' Tony said hurriedly, 'it's really more like…vanished, temporarily.'

'Where is he?'

'No idea,' Tony told him. 'Fury wants us to search but, you're grounded for this one.'

Bruce expected a reaction. He expected Barton to challenge it, to demand to be part of the team. Instead the agent just nodded sharply and then left.

'Damn.' Tony swore, 'he was _not_ supposed to know.'

'Well he does,' Bruce put his book aside and stood up. 'Was that the truth or does Fury know where Loki's gone?'

'No, he really does want us to search.' He shook his head, frustrated. 'The guy could be _miles_ away.'

…

Finding him had been easy. Loki knew very little about Earth so it stood to reason he would retreat to a pre-established hide-out. He probably didn't even remember that Clint had picked every single one of them out – it was the first thing he'd done once they'd escaped from the S.H.I.E.L.D complex. His mistake. The hard part had been sneaking out without attracting the attention of any of the 'guards' Fury had posted around the mansion in the hopes of preventing just that. It had taken a lot of skill, a little bit of luck, and a few stupid death-defying stunts he had miraculously pulled off without obtaining any broken limbs. He would have a killer bruise on his back, though, if he survived the night. He'd stolen weapons from two guards that he had knocked out specifically for that purpose and, while he preferred his bow, he could just as easily put a bullet through Loki's skull and figured he'd feel just as much satisfaction.

He'd also had to avoid his team-mates – who were souring the city from the skies. It hadn't been too hard. He had mostly kept to the shadows, moving quickly and silently and steering clear of rooves and open spaces. It had taken him an hour to reach the first hide-out, on foot as he was, but when he got there it had been deserted with no signs of recent activity. It was just a small room off an alleyway, nothing special. Honestly he hadn't expected Loki to be there anyway. The only other one within running distance was where he had hoped to find him. If he hadn't, then the plan was to commandeer some kind of flying vehicle and search each and every one of them until he found the guy. Luckily, he had found him right where he expected him to be.

Now he was watching from the rafters – having entered through a hidden hole in the roof – as Loki paced within the small confines of the room. He felt a coil of hatred stir in his stomach, but squashed it. He wasn't going to be making any mistakes this time. One of them was going to die, and it wasn't going to be him.

'Are you _ever_ going to come down, Agent Barton?' Loki remarked casually, glancing up at his hiding spot with a slight smile. 'Is it not considered polite to announce one's presence when visiting a friend?'

Clint gripped the wood so hard he felt splinters dig into his fingers and then released it, swinging down to land quietly on the floor below.

'I think you'll find that common courtesy isn't typically extended to villains.'

Loki chuckled, the sound filling the room with false cheer.

'Am I a villain? How quaint. Do you think yourself a _hero_, Agent Barton?'

'Whatever I am,' he growled, eyes never once leaving Loki's. 'It's a damn sight better than you.'

'Is that so?' Loki mused. 'Do you have _standards_? A code of conduct? _Ethics_?' He scoffed, 'you heroes, you prance around thinking you're so _good_ and _righteous_ but you never stop to realise just how shackled you are by the very virtues that define you.'

'I have no virtues. The few I had, I sacrificed long ago.' He smile was feral, animalistic. 'So you'll forgive me if I don't play true to the stereotype.'

'Oh yes,' Loki's lips parted in a truly unnerving parody of a smile. 'As I seem to recall you had absolutely no qualms when it came to killing your people…your _friends_.' The light glinted off of his bared teeth. 'I've never seen someone take to it quite so spectacularly.'

'That was your tricks, your magic.' Barton countered, almost desperately. It was one thing to think that to himself, but to hear Loki say it? His hand was hovering over the gun attached to his belt, but he had yet to draw it.

'Your heart.' Loki opened his hands wide, his expression softening in mock comfort. 'I only brought to the surface what resided deep within it. I could never make you do something you were incapable of. It was all you, Agent Barton, was it not?' He stepped closer, that smile still tugging at the corners of his mouth. 'You can lie to your friends, perhaps even to me, but you cannot lie to yourself.'

'No.' He stepped back, his fists clenching. He had been wrong before, it was Loki's fault. It was. It had to be.

'You would have killed her, would you not?' Loki advanced upon him, drawing nearer with every piercing word. 'Had she given you the chance, you would have slit her throat and revelled in the hot blood sluicing down your arms.' His voice was soft, sinuous.

'No.' Clint forced himself to stand his ground. The imagery his words evoked brought to mind that horrific dream. But it _hadn't_ happened.

'You would have held her down as you etched the memories of your murderous past into her soft flesh. Would have listened to her desperate, dying, screams and supped them greedily from the air.'

'No. Shut UP.' He drew the gun in one fluid motion and levelled it.

'The truth can be painful,' Loki said with mock sympathy. 'But what is it you humans say…ah, yes. It sets you free. How quaint.' He spread his arms wide. 'Unlock your shackles, Agent Barton. Let yourself become what you truly are. What point is there in clinging to false ideals, when all they do is hold you back? You are no hero, Agent Barton; the blood that stains my hands stains yours as well.'

…

'Agent Romanoff?' Nick Fury's voice filtered in through the communication system on board the ship. 'We have a minor situation.'

'What is it?' Tony answered for her. He had just flown in after having searched his section of the city with no luck. 'Loki running rampant through a nearby town?'

'No such luck,' Fury sighed through the microphone. 'Haven't heard a peep out of him. It's Agent Barton – he's given us the slip.'

Natasha cursed loudly in Russian as she slammed her fist down on the dashboard.

'Woah don't do that,' Steve protested as the ship swung violently to the side.

'We have to find him,' Natasha said as she corrected the ship. 'Loki will destroy him.'

'Surely he has some kind of weapon,' Steve pointed out, clutching a nearby rail for dear life.

'I do not believe a mortal weapon exists that could kill my brother,' Thor intoned gravely. 'Agent Barton will not be able to overcome him.'

'I have an idea,' Tony rummaged around in a bag he'd shoved in the corner earlier and pulled out a small computer pad. He fiddled with it for a few seconds and then pointed at Steve triumphantly. 'Hah! I told you he doesn't clean his boots.'

…

A/N: Sorry another short update but writers block coupled with study demands makes it tough to write. Thanks again for the reviews, favs, alerts etc. You guys are awesome


	5. Chapter 5

Where we left our hero…

'The truth can be painful,' Loki said with mock sympathy. 'But what is it you humans say…ah, yes. It sets you free. How quaint.' He spread his arms wide. 'Unlock your shackles, Agent Barton. Let yourself become what you truly are. What point is there in clinging to false ideals, when all they do is hold you back? You are no hero, Agent Barton; the blood that stains my hands stains yours as well.'

Loki was right. It was what haunted his nightmares, what shadowed his every step. There was blood on his hands; the blood of strangers and friends alike. He was responsible, and he would never be free of it. A lifetime of good deeds could not even begin to wash away his sins.

'You…made me like this.' He rasped.

'I think not,' Loki stepped forward. 'Admit it, Agent Barton. You were lost long before my sights fell on your pitiful planet.'

'I followed orders – there were _reasons_.' His grip was slipping, cold metal sliding against the sweat beading on his skin.

'Did you know them?' Loki's voice was soft, gentle. 'Tell me, why did they have to die?'

'I don't…I don't,' he shook his head to clear his thoughts. He hadn't needed to know – _didn't_ need to know. They were marked for death and he was the deliverer.

'You never knew. Perhaps you never cared. After all, the death of a stranger matters not. But answer me this, Agent Barton, what right have _you_ to judge me?' The words were piercing even as the demi-God's honeyed tongue imparted them with such false sweetness. 'We are the same, you and I. _That_ is why you hate me. I am what you could become were you not so afraid, so _weak_. Chained by the ideals you so desperately cleave to. Do you believe them to be your _salvation?_' He laughed cruelly. 'It is a foolish notion.'

'You have it all wrong.' He whispered. His fingers tightened, the index curling firmly around the trigger.

'Is that so?' Loki grinned, clearly delighted. 'Do enlighten me.'

'I hate you,' he locked his eyes on the target. 'Because you're _evil_.'

He pressed the trigger.

For a moment it seemed as if nothing had happened. Loki was still standing there, face frozen in his typical wolfish smirk. Then he fell to his knees, his right hand coming up to scratch at the cloth covering his chest as blood began to seep through. The smile seemed to stutter; his eyes creasing as he looked down and then back up at him. Clint, too, was frozen in place. His finger still curled over the trigger, his breath caught in his throat. Their eyes locked.

The corners of Loki's mouth twitched before he was back on his feet quicker than Clint's eyes could follow, an amused chuckle reverberating off of the walls.

'Oh come now, Agent Barton.' He placed a palm to his chest and the blood receded. 'Did you truly believe you had killed me? With this?' He twirled the bullet between two fingers, a metallic glint in his green eyes. 'You should know better.' A flash of his fingers, and it was gone. Banished.

The next one hit him dead centre in his forehead. It also caused him to stagger back a few inches, though he remained on his feet.

'Is that absolutely necessary?' Loki complained, dragging the bullet out.

'It's mildly satisfying.' Clint dropped the gun, it was out of ammo. He didn't bother to reach for the other one. 'Better if it _had_ killed you, but…' he shrugged.

'I think you will find that an impossible task.' Loki's voice, for once, was not mocking.

'I think you'll find that I'm more than happy to try,' Clint settled into a balanced stance.

'You will fail,' Loki warned him.

'Or _you_ will die.'

Loki chuckled.

'So be it.'

Clint was on him in a second or, rather, where he used to be. It was like chasing smoke. Loki was _fast_. He didn't just dodge punches, he _vanished_. One second he was right there, smirking, and the next he was half-way across the room, leaning against the wall with a bored expression on his face. Clint had nothing but air in his hands and simmering anger in his heart. The bastard wouldn't even hit back. He had to even the odds somehow, or he was going to collapse from exhaustion long before he even got near the guy.

'You're cheating,' he accused.

'Magic is as much a part of my arsenal, as your bow is yours.' Loki countered, his eyes dancing.

'I don't have my bow,' Clint pointed out.

'No, I suppose you do not.' The demi-God seemed to ponder it for a moment and then acquiesced. 'Very well.' His eyes flashed. 'I do like a challenge.'

…

They had managed to pinpoint Barton's location via the tracker Tony had hidden in his boot after the first one – planted on one of the butter knives – had been detected. Although he knew Barton's reaction should he find said tracker would not be kind, it somehow hadn't frightened him as much as the thought of planting a tracker on Natasha had.

Tony respected Barton, sure. He knew the man was capable of killing him in just as many ways as Natasha (maybe even more); he was just…quieter about it. Ergo, not as scary. He was therefore surprised at the scene that met his eyes when they, the Avengers, burst into the little room to find Loki sprawled out, and seemingly unconscious, on the floor while Clint leant against the wall looking down the barrel of the gun he held firmly in his hands. In the many scenarios Thor had worriedly concocted while they were all fretting over Barton, the archer had never once come out on top. It was supposedly a fact that Loki could not be stopped, or killed, by any 'mortal' means. Yet there he was looking relatively unharmed while the demi-God was clearly out for the count.

Barton looked up abruptly as they entered and Tony blinked in surprise. There were actual _tears_ in the other man's eyes. That wasn't to say he was crying. He wasn't. In fact, if Barton's sudden movement hadn't dislodged one, single, tear Tony probably wouldn't have noticed at all. Everyone else was starting to look relieved – even Thor, who had panicked initially – except for Natasha. She looked worried. It was testament to just how worried she truly was that Tony had even picked up on it.

'Clint?' Her voice was softer than usual as she took a tentative step forward.

No one else seemed to notice. Thor and Steve were too busy with Loki; the former checking each and every bruise or cut, the latter wrapping their new prisoner into a neat little present for S.H.I.E.L.D_. _That is to say he was applying the special security measures that Banner had developed to detain the demi-God. Banner was overseeing the process which left Tony to take a closer look at Barton to see if he could spot what Natasha apparently had.

The agent was still looking at the gun, his eyes fixed on the barrel. His hands were clasped around it as if he were about to shoot. Tony glanced at Natasha, the question dying on his lips. It was obvious what she thought.

'Clint? She took another step closer, stopping as his head snapped up.

'He's right, Tasha.' Barton murmured, distress clear on his face.

'Right about what?' Natasha prodded gently, her gaze darting to his hands and then back to his face.

'Me.' The agent said simply. His hair was slightly damp, like he'd been sweating, and stray tendrils were plastered to the side of his face. He was bruised in several places, dark colour blossoming in his cheeks. A lone scratch that looked to be caused by a fingernail stretched across the line of his neck. There was despair in his eyes. He looked like a man at the end of his rope. Tony wondered what Loki could possibly have said and cursed him for it. If there was one thing the trickster was good at; it was tearing people apart.

'Whatever that psychopath said, it was a lie.' Tony told him. 'It's what he does for a living – God of lies, remember?'

'Not a lie,' Barton shook his head desolately.

Natasha shot Tony a furious look that clearly said _stay out of it you idiot, or I'll rip out your intestines with my fingernails. _

'What did he tell you?' She questioned gently, taking another step forward and kneeling so she was at eye-level. Tony could see her eyes flick to the gun, probably calculating if she could snatch it without setting it off. He wondered why she just didn't grab it; it wasn't like Barton would actually…would he?

'The truth,' Barton rasped. 'About me…I knew it before but…' he lapsed into mumbling undecipherable words.

'Knew what?' Natasha prompted. Her knuckles were almost white with the pressure she was exerting and Tony was sure she'd have little marks on her palms when the whole ordeal was over. She stole glances at Loki every so often as if to check if he was awake. Tony had no doubt what awaited the Trickster and, in his opinion, the guy deserved everything he was going to get and then some. The others still seemed to be preoccupied. Thor was picking Loki up to carry him to the ship, Steve hovering near him and trying to be helpful. Banner was watching them out of the corner of his eye and Tony had the feeling that he knew exactly what was going on.

'I'm just as bad as him, Nat.' Barton said finally. 'I've killed as much, and for as little reason.'

'That's ridiculous,' she said flatly. 'You can't take all the credit.'

Tony was mildly concerned that veiled humour was hardly the best method for dealing with this particular crisis but stopped his protest when Barton's lips actually quivered in mild amusement.

'Guess not,' he allowed. He looked down at the gun, his gaze distant. 'It's so easy…to end a life. So easy…so final.' A shadow of pain creased his face and he looked up, eyes frantically searching for something Tony couldn't identify. 'I should have _missed_.'

Understanding dawned on Natasha's face.

'No, God, Clint.' There was an edge of frustration in her voice. 'That wasn't your fault, you can't blame yourself.'

'It was,' he growled. 'You don't get it, do you?'

'Obviously.'

'I wasn't just under Loki's influence,' he dropped his gaze. 'Mindless, compelled to cater to his every whim.' His voice was bitter, his eyes dark. 'I was _thinking_ and I _wanted_ to do it. I _wanted_ to kill you, Nat, and I would have. I would have,' his voice broke mid-way through the word. 'If you'd given me the chance. I can't just forget that. I can't pretend that it never happened.'

'Clint, it _didn't_ happen.'

If Tony hadn't known any better he would have thought Natasha looked ready to slap the other agent.

'Guys, what's the hold up?' Steve obliviously poked his head back around the door, his hand resting on the frame.

'Get out.' Natasha spun around, rising to her feet, her voice venomous.

Steve's eyes widened and he backed off immediately, throwing his hands up in the 'defenceless' posture.

'You, too, Stark.' She growled, sending a chilly glare his way. 'Get Loki to S.H.I.E.L.D.'

'Are you..?'

'Go.' She turned back to Barton, dropping once again into a crouch.

Tony hesitated, torn between staying and eavesdropping (and potentially getting mauled) and respecting her violent wishes by getting the hell out of there. Self-preservation won out and he headed to the door, walking slowly in the hopes that he might catch something on his way out. Natasha was talking softly, though, and he couldn't make anything she was saying out. Barton was silent, his face creased and his hands still clasped around the gun. Tony paused by the door, looking over his shoulder just in time to see Natasha slowly place one hand over Barton's and gently draw it away. The move was so uncommonly tender that he turned away, feeling somewhat voyeuristic – as if he was looking in on a private moment between the two.

He found Steve just outside the building leaning against the wall with a perplexed expression on his face.

'What was that?' He demanded the moment he noticed Tony's arrival.

'I'll explain it to you later,' Tony promised. 'For now, we need to get Rudolph to S.H.I.E. then onto the next intergalactic subway with the farthest possible destination.'

…

He was drowning. Drowning in an endless ocean of self-loathing and hatred. Everything Loki had said to him, he had already known. His words had only confirmed the knowledge that plagued his every thought. He was not just a killer, he was a _murderer_. He had never thought of himself thusly, had always believed that there were reasons – _good_ reasons – for every life he had taken, every family he had torn asunder. He had deluded himself. Maybe there were reasons, maybe they were justified, but that wasn't why he had done it. He _enjoyed _it. He savoured the thrill of the hunt, the adrenaline that suffused his system with every flawless kill. He was a monster, like Loki. They were the same. It sickened him. Everything he thought he had stood for had been a lie. 'False ideals' he used, desperately, to retain a semblance of humanity. The truth – how ironic that it had taken the God of _lies_ to show it to him – was that he was lost.

He was trying to tell Natasha. Trying to show her why she was wasting her breath, that it wasn't worth the effort to save a soulless monster. She, of course, wasn't listening.

'Do you enjoy it?' He cut in, desperate to prove his point.

'Do I enjoy what?' She was still clasping his right hand, though his left remained wrapped firmly around the gun.

'Killing.'

'You know that I don't.' She searched his eyes, her gaze penetrating.

'I do.' He whispered, looking away. Her hand hands tightened around his, fingernails digging into his skin.

'No you don't.' She said firmly. 'Loki may have tricked you into believing that, but it doesn't make it true.'

'It is true,' he wished she would just understand.

'No, Clint.' She forced his chin up so he met her steely gaze. 'I know you, you aren't like that.'

'What if I am?' He asked, almost desperately.

'You once told me that you could remember every single person you had ever killed.' Her voice dropped to a whisper. 'It was the night you were sent to kill me – the night you saved my life.'

He remembered. She had been a mercenary assassin selling her considerable services to the highest bidder, irrespective of the target, and S.H.I.E.L.D had wanted her stopped. They'd sent him.

'You said that every day you could see their faces and it reminded you that death was not a game.' Her fingers moved, gently brushing against the skin of his neck. 'It is not a power to be wielded over others, nor an escape from demons better faced and overcome. Death is final, there is no coming back and it should _never_ be taken lightly.' She moved closer, the heat of her breath ghosting across his lips. 'We deserve to bear the burdens the use of such a weapon places upon us because it keeps us sane, it makes us _human_.'

'You remember that?' His breath hitched slightly at her proximity, his gaze falling to the millimetres of space that separated them.

'Can you still see their faces?' Her left hand was still pressed against his neck, her right curling around the barrel of the gun.

'Always.' He let it go, his grip loosening as she pulled it from his grasp and tossed it aside.

…

A/N: Another short one. It's wrapping up now though guys. One more chapter I think and it'll be the end. Thanks so much for the lovely reviews, faves, and alerts from all of you wonderful people. It's amazing how inspiring a single review can be to a writer even if it's only a few words.


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